2007 Porsche Cayman
The Cayman is the Mason Dixon line between rich and poor. This doesn't mean that a Cayman owner is rich. It doesn't mean that a Boxster owner is poor. It just means there's a line, for good or ill. We're silly creatures, us humans. Our bilateral symmetry makes us prejudiced toward invisible lines. We draw them in damn near everything. Ideas that run along the gap between our caveman definitions between black and white are mocked and vilified. Porsche's Cayman is not the foreman's weekend Boxter, nor is it the parcel owner's 911. The Cayman lies in that horrible DMZ, taking hate from both sides. Even I can't help myself. I must place the Cayman somewhere, but where? From my perspective, from my bank account, The Cayman is a Rich-Man's Car. Transcript INTRO by MR REGULAR as HUNTER S. THOMPSON AND GROANING Another tragic night fueled by Old Crow and 1970's two-tone. I awoke in a municipal parking lot, staring into the eyes of the 1911's little boo-hoo brother. -- INTRO SONG: "Madness" by Madness It's gonna be rougher. It's gonna be tougher, But I won't be the one- -- MONOLOGUE by MR REGULAR as HUNTER S THOMPSON I knew the damn bastards had it in for me. They're trying to get me to compromise my principles with this ruseless(?) kraut. Kraut? No! No, it's a term of endearment. My family can be traced back to Northern Deutschland. That's not the point. the point is that a Porsche Cayman is not for the proletariat. Prostituting ad-men perhaps, but not journalists. You understand? This had to be a trick. The door was wide open, and my contact was surprisingly magnamonioussic. "Just drive it!" he says, as if he was offering me a Huffy mountain bike. This was a trick, and even if it wasn't, I had to know. I had to know the truth! "Where's the engine?" I demanded. You can't see it. What sort of honest two-seater would hide its soul? Tools! We need tools, and mechanical and philosophical instruments! My contact was again accommodating, pulling back the Cayman's bush. Oh no, no, no, no, no! They expected this move! Or HE expected this move. We've come this far, no turning back now. I snatch the star driver from my contact's hands. Time is precious, and this hot Autobahn burner was drawing a crowd. And the last thing I needed was ass-scratching looky-lewds. Paydirt! Ha! This Cayman is moved by a 2.7 liter flat six naturally aspirated shoe box making 245 horsepower. starts, Mr. Regular recoils in fear. Augh! No indication at all what these components do. Where are the cylinder heads? No leads. What are these tubes? No labels. Unmarked hoses for pumping vaporized ibogaine into the passenger cabin. Nope, nope, close the cowl! Nothing! I want nothing. My lungs heaved to expel this Cayman's poison. My contact explained that the Cayman's catalytic converter is so thorough that it makes meeting your maker in an Altoona storage unit an impossible task. I made a note of that, and plan to test this theory to the fullest. Anything worth doing is worth doing right. I told this to my contact. He didn't understand. Never mind. It was time for a drive, long shift linkages and tiny half-shafts and all. "No sense hanging around this parking lot," I thought. We were of course the absolute cream of the automotive press, forged when the world was young. "Yes, sir! You belong behind the wheel!" All automobiles tell stories, that's for damn sure. They have their narratives and peaks and valleys and orgasms and crying fits at the parts counter, and they also have audiences and onlookers, even if these people are merely sidewalk spectators. And sitting in this Teutonic gurney filled me with rotten envy. I wanted to piss all over its carefully stitched leather seats. I wanted to extinguish a thousand Pall Malls on its tight dash and use spent spark plugs to raggedly carve the words, "The only war worth fighting is a class war," into this Cayman's sparkling multi-layer paint. Anything to remind the owner exactly where he stands among the order of things. But if I was to see this assignment to completion I need to win my contact's friendship. It was only reasonable. So let's get down to brass tacks. Yes, the Porsche Cayman is a fine machine. It will excite you, in the same way an experienced madam can use ring pliers in a manner congruent to their original purpose. This Cayman's 245 horsepower puts the car mid-shelf between the Boxter and the 911. This Cayman shares a number of body components with the bargain Boxter as well. Five weeks prior, a snaggletoothed hair-gelled crook near Spats Airfield told me that the rear hatch of the Cayman made it the most practical two-seater you could buy. The swindler's Park City Jewlery kiosk Rolex revealed his place in nature's hierarchy. Could that seersucker know that the brakes on the Cayman were smaller than those in the Cayman S? Or that the Cayman S has 295 horsepower while this base Cayman has 245? I pressed the bastard and he waved to an accompanying Cayman S in the showroom. He was lying to me. That machine was a siren only wearing Cayman S's wheels as an option. Yes, yes, you can do that! There's no room for trust in this rotten year of our Lord 2013. The Cayman doesn't have a dipstick. "Put your faith in the computer," they said. I did that once, and it lead to an OK Cupid date with a pre-op in New Hope. We went bowling. My contact directed me to the Cayman's roofline, where tricky dollhouse doors hold mounting points for roof racks and topside ordnance. What kind of Apsen ski poser would latch a ski rack to the to top of their Porsche and pretend its a schlubby Jeep Liberty? The hubris it would take to pass oneself off as rugged in this scalpel of a machine! But what else could Porsche do but double cast the Cayman as both Prince and Pauper? Why do that? The Cayman fell victim to the gross lassitude of the bursting mid-2000s real estate bubble. Style and refinement had to dress in Carhartts no matter how contrived. It was not fashionable to be rich in those days, and the Porsche emblem looks yuppier that the embroidered crest upon a spectator's polo shirt at the Americas Cup. In 2007 mustachioed men were constantly jacking off and crying at computer printout images of Joe the Plumber. Financially comfortable members of society became villains. The new hero for 2007 was an uncircumcised rapist with two estranged wives, six dirt-faced children sucking on the teat of social services, and a sideswiped Chevy Blazer parked outside of Ollie's with bad tags. No room at all for nicely weighted steering wheels and creature comforts in that world, or this one for that matter. Like it or not, I could never drive this exciting machine to any of my favorite bars. As this assignment dragged on I tried to keep a clear head, but all I could think about while driving this Cayman is a lonely feeling of exclusivity. And it never left, even when I felt that rearward flat six obediently push me along with Meridian Bank assurance, drinking nothing but the finest 93 octane. There is an unspoken agreement between you and the machine. This Cayman will corner like a slot car and obey every vice in your right foot, and in exchange you will clean up your vocabulary, buy Girl Scout cookies and drop ten dollars in the collection plate. Tuck in your shirt and smile for the speed camera, because every wrathful cop with a lesbian daughter is having a bad day and looking for someone to blame. -- OUTRO: MR REGULAR crawls into the frunk of a 2007 PORSCHE CAYMAN Ohhh, this is how it started last time. Ugggggnnnn-no, wait! I think I can! Uh...Wait...my head... there we go! I'm inside! Hehe. This is really uncomfortable. Let me see if - oh, I can't reach it! Oh, it's a fault in the design! If I'm in the wrong way I can't squeeze around and reach the handle! It's getting hot! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! opens Rabblerabblerabblerabble! Laughs Category:The Early Years Category:Reviews